In my humble opinion, what you have described is the essence of a first person story. You are immersed in what is happening and will only get glimpses of any back story via the thoughts of the person you are looking through the eyes of. If they know what is going on then they will be thinking it and it will come out in your story....if they don't then what comes out is them wondering, "What did I do to deserve this?".

A good first person story doesn't give you all the answers simply because the main character doesn't know either. You get to discover the story as the character does.